Birthday extravaganza

The birthday party was a huge success, despite the weather.

The forecast called for rain, heavy at times, starting right around the time our party was supposed to start. So at the last minute we called everyone involved and made arrangements to start the party at 11 a.m. instead of 1:30 p.m.

Even still, about an hour before the party it was drizzling enough to start making us nervous. So as we’ve had to do in past years, we strung the huge tarp we use for camping over the patio and a section of the backyard. At least the nine kids we had (counting our own two) would be dry while eating. We decided we just wouldn’t care if they got a little wet in the bouncy-bounce we had set up.

Sure enough, about 10 minutes after the party ended, the heavens opened up and it’s been pouring on and off ever since. I’m so glad we changed the time.

As Kris mentioned before, the party had a “Star Wars” theme. Besides the bouncy-bounce, every kid who came was outfitted with a Jedi robe and got an inflatable sword that stood in for a lightsaber. Yeah, nothing beats inviting a bunch of 5- and 6-year-old boys over and giving them weapons!

The kids were also given squirt guns. At some point one of the kids started squirting me. Before you know it, a battle cry of “Get Mr. Rooney!” was being called out by all the kids. So what else could I do? I grabbed at sword and a squirt gun and took the crowd of kids on! We all wound up soaking wet and laughing hard.

After lunch was served, we had a surprise guest—Kris arranged for Mr. Ding-A-Ling to pull right into our driveway and serve ice cream to the kids. That was a big hit.

As the dust from the party settled we had time to start cracking into some of Nolan’s presents. Nearly everything he got at his party was “Star Wars” related. He got several action figures, some new lightsabers and a couple of “Star Wars” Transformers. We gave him a SpongeBob SquarePants skateboard along with a new helmet and a set of elbow, knee and wrist pads.

At the end of the day, Nolan was exhausted, but he went to bed a very happy 6-year-old boy.